HEADLINES
A340 is shown to
Air Mauritius on
first outing
Airbus Industrie took advan tage of the A340's return
flight from the Asian Aerospace
show in Singapore last week to
demonstrate the aircraft to
a potential new customer,
Air Mauritius.
The aircraft left Singapore on
25 February and flew directly to
Mauritius, en route to Tou
louse, carrying Airbus managing
director Jean Pierson. Air Mau
ritius operates Boeing 767-
200ERs, but is understood to be
looking for two aircraft in the
A340/Boeing 777/McDonnell
Douglas MD-11 class.
The A340's appearance in
Singapore was its first trip away
from base, and interrupted the
flight-test programme, which
started with the first flight on
25 October, 1991. The aircraft
left Toulouse on 23 Feb
ruary, with a take-off weight
of 248,000kg, 9,000kg below
the maximum.
The aircraft carried 22,000kg
of test equipment, and burned
80,000kg of fuel. Airbus will
not reveal any details of the
A340's performance in flight
test to date, before briefing a
meeting of airline customers on
10 March. •
See Asian Aerospace P.8
Fokker 70 indecision sows
confusion at Regioliner
BY DOUGLAS BARRIE
IN SINGAPORE
The future of the tri-national Regioliner regional aircraft
programme is being called into
question with confusion sur
rounding the status of negotia
tions between Deutsche Aero
space (DASA) and Dutch manu
facturer Fokker.
Fokker has warned DASA that
it must choose between involve
ment in the Fokker 70 and the
launch of its 90- to 120-seat
Regioliner programme.
Deutsche Airbus, a member of
the DASA group of companies,
is a 27% risk-sharing partner
with Fokker, building large sec
tions of the fuselage on the
Fokker 100, and is a proposed
partner in the 70- to 90-seat
Fokker 70 programme, which
clashes with the Regioliner.
Erik Jan Nederkoorn, chair
man of Fokker's management
board and its chief executive
officer, says: "Quite frankly,
time is up" for DASA to make a
decision. Fokker already has
K-8 COCKPIT REVEALED
The front cockpit of the K-8 primary trainer, co-developed by China and
Pakistan, shows the Rockwell-Collins twin-screen electronic flight
instrumentation system dominating the instrument panel and the backup
analogue instruments (see Asian Aerospace, P 12).
"back-up plans", he says, should
DASA need to be replaced on the
Fokker 70, and possibly the
Fokker 100, programmes.
DASA, along with Alenia and
Aerospatiale, is on the verge of
launching a family of turbofan
regional aircraft, with the man
agement company, tentatively
named Regioliner.
While DASA maintains offi
cially that its position on the
programme remains unchanged,
this confidence is not reflected
by some of its partners.
Raffaele Esposito, Alenia's
general manager, says: "We're
waiting to understand better
the position of the players. A
certain equilibrium has been
broken. The element that broke
this is the Fokker question.
"We felt it was the right part
nership, the right aircraft and it
was going ahead, then there is
this perturbation. The future
was clear to us but now we have
to wait and see."
Nederkoorn is keen to keep
Deutsche Airbus within the Fok
ker programme. In spite of this
he appears adamant that DASA
must decide between the Regio
liner and the Fokker 70.
In trying to keep DASA on
board the of programmes, Ned
erkoorn says the company is
willing to give the Germanm
company a greater role. "We're
pragmatic businessmen, any
thing can be discussed."
Nederkoorn says an answer
Singapore to buy GEC Ferranti TIALD
The Republic of Singapore Air Force is negotiating with
GEC Ferranti to purchase the
thermal-imaging laser designator
(TIALD) pod for its General
Dynamics F-16A/B.
The pod, if bought, would
increase substantially the F-16's
stand-off attack capability in the
air-to-surface role, allowing the
aircraft to carry a variety of
laser-guided weapons.
GEC Ferranti has already sub
mitted detailed proposals to the
air force and the pod is thought
to have been trial-fitted to an
RSAF F-16. Fitting the system to
the F-16 requires a slight change
in its configuration. The rear
part of the pod has to be hinged
to comply with maintenance re
quirements for the aircraft.
GEC Ferranti declines to com
ment on its negotiations with
the Singapore air force.
To date the system has been
purchased only by the Royal Air
Force which used it successfully
on Tornado GR.ls in the Gulf
War with Iraq. A second South-
East Asian nation, believed to be
Malaysia, is also understood to
be considering purchase of the
TIALD pods. •
Italy opts for Israeli Opher bomb kits
The Italian air force has de cided to procure the Israeli-
developed Opher infra-red
terminal-guidance kit for bombs,
for use on its AMX fighter
bombers, according to Govern
ment sources in Rome.
Opher was developed by Elbit
to an air force requirement. The
kit uses a passive imaging infra
red seeker attached to the nose
of a general-purpose bomb,
making it a guided weapon. The
kit enables the delivery of
bombs in all modes — dive
release, low-altitude loft/toss or
high-altitude attack. Opher was
designed to target tanks and
armoured vehicles, artillery, air-
defence batteries and ships. •
FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 4 - 10 March, 1992